"From the cathedral you must keep going down hill for an hour to reach the Faubourg d'Aiguilhe, where another monument rears its head, which is natural and historic, at one and the same time, and, indeed, the most curious thing in the world. It is a volcanic sugar-loaf three hundred feet in height, which you mount by a spiral stairway until you reach a Byzantine chapel, necessarily quite small, but charming, and built, it is said, on the site and from the fragments of a temple to Diana.
"A legend is current here, which struck me forcibly. A young girl, a Christian virgin, pursued by some miscreant, flung herself to escape him down from the top of the terrace; she arose at once; she was unharmed. The miracle was noised abroad. She was declared a saint. Pride grew strong in her heart; she promised to hurl herself down again, to show she was under the protection of angels; but this time Heaven deserted her, and she was crushed like a vain silly creature as she was.
"Pride! yes, God leaves the proud to themselves, and without him what can they do? But do not tell me that I am proud. No, it is not pride. I have no desire to prove anything to any one. I ask to be forgotten, and that there should be no suffering on my account.
"There is near Le Puy, forming a part of its magnificent landscape, a village that also crowns one of those singular, isolated rocks, which break through the soil here at every step. It is called Espaly, and this rock also bears up the ruins of a feudal castle and of Celtic grottos. One of these caves is inhabited by two persons, aged and poor, whose squalid misery is heart-rending. This couple live here in the solid rock, with a single hole for chimney and window. At night they block up the door, in winter with straw; in summer, with the old woman's petticoat. A small, rude bed without coverlids or mattress, two stools, a little iron lamp, a spinning-wheel, and two or three earthen pots,—these are all the furniture.
"Nevertheless, only a few paces from them there is a vast and splendid house belonging to the Jesuits and named the Paradise. At the foot of the rock flows a brook which brings down precious stones in its sand. The old woman sold me for twenty sous a handful of garnets, sapphires, and jacinths, which I am keeping for Lili. The stones are too small to have any actual value, but there must be a precious deposit somewhere among these rocks. The Jesuit fathers will find it, perhaps; I don't expect to make the discovery myself, however; so I must think about procuring some work. Peyraque has an idea which he has enlarged upon for the last few days, and which was suggested to him by this very rock of Espaly; I will tell you how.
"While strolling about over this rock, I was taken with one of my sudden fancies for a little child, playing in the lap of a pretty woman from the village, who was strong and cheerful. This child, you see, I can compare with no one but our Charley, for inspiring affection. He does not look like Charley, but has the same demure playfulness, and the shy caresses which make one his willing slave. When I called upon Peyraque to admire him, remarking how clean he was kept, and that his mother made no lace, but seemed wholly taken up with him, as if she knew she had a treasure there, Peyraque at once replied, 'You have come nearer the truth than you thought. This child is a treasure for Dame Roqueberte. If you ask who he is, she will tell you it is the child of a sister she has in Clermont; but this is not true: the little one has been placed in her charge by a gentleman whom no one knows, who pays her for rearing it, who pays her, besides, for taking great care of it, as if it were the son of a prince. So you see this woman is well dressed and does not work. She was in easy circumstances before. Her husband has charge of the castle of Polignac, whose great tower, and in fact all the ruined portion, you can see over yonder, on a rock larger and loftier than that of Espaly; that is where she lives, and, if you meet her here, it is because now she has such fine chances for pleasure strolls. The real mother of the little one must be dead, for she has never been heard of; but the father comes to see it, leaves money, and stipulates that it shall not be allowed to want for anything.'
"You see, dear sister, this is a romance. That is partly what attracted me perhaps, since, according to your ideas, I am quite romantic. Certainly this little boy has something about him which captivates the imagination. He is not strong; they say when he first came here he had hardly life enough to breathe; but now he is quite blooming, and the mountain air agrees with him so well that his father, who came here at about this time last year to take him away, decided to leave him a year longer, in order to have him regain his strength completely. The little creature has an angelic face, dreamy eyes, with a far-off look in them, strange in a child of his age, and there is a wondrous grace in all his ways.
"Peyraque, seeing me so bewitched, scratched his head with an air of profundity and continued, 'Well, tell me, then, since you are fond of little children, why, instead of making it your occupation to read aloud, which must be wearisome, do you not find a little pupil like that, whom you could educate at your sister's with the other children? This would leave you in your own home and to your own ways.'
"'You forget, my good Peyraque, that perhaps it will be long before I can go to my sister.'
"'Well, then, your sister might come and live here, or else you could stay with us for a year or two; my wife would aid you in taking care of the child, and you would only have the trouble of watching over him and teaching him.—Stop! I have an idea of my own about this child, since he pleases you so that you are doting on him already. His father will come after him one of these days. Suppose I should tell him about you?'
"'Then you are acquainted with him!'
"'I acted as driver for him once, and carried him to the mountain in my carriage. He seems a fine man, but too young to take upon himself the bringing up of a child of three years. He will have to place it in charge of some woman, and he cannot leave it any longer with the Roqueberts, for they are not capable of teaching what a young gentleman like him ought to know. This would be your own task, especially, and the father would never find so good a mother for his child. Hope, hope! (which signifies wait!) I will keep watch at Polignac, and as soon as this father arrives, I will manage to talk with him in the proper way.'
"I let good Peyraque cultivate this project, and Justine also, but I have no faith in it myself, for the mysterious personage expected will ask questions I am unwilling to have answered, unless I am quite sure he knows none of the people, either intimately or remotely, from whom my place of retreat must be concealed. And how could I make sure of that? Peyraque's idea is, nevertheless, in itself a good one. To educate some child at home for a few years would please me infinitely better than going into a strange family again. I would rather take a girl than a boy, as she would be left with me a longer time; but there will be little room for choice, for these children hidden away by their parents are not easy to find. And there must needs be the most perfect confidence in me. I must be well recommended. Madame d'Arglade, who knows all the secrets of fashionable life, could find for me a chance like this; but I would rather not apply to her: without intending to do so, she might bring upon me some fresh misfortune."
A few days later Caroline wrote again to her sister.
"POLIGNAC, May 15.
"Here I have been for five days past, in one of the most imposing ruined castles left from feudal times, on the summit of a great, black lava boulder, like those I told you about in connection with Le Puy and Espaly. You will think my position has changed, and my dream has become reality. No: I am certainly near little Didier, but I have taken it upon myself to watch over him, for his father or protector has not yet appeared. Now see what has happened.
"I felt a wish to see the child again, besides a slight wish to learn more about him; and lastly I had a desire to examine closely this castle of Polignac, which looks from afar like a city of giants, on a rock from the infernal depths. It is the strongest mediæval fortress in the country; it was the nest of that terrible race of vultures under whose ravages Velay, Forez, and Auvergne have trembled. The ancient lords of Polignac have left everywhere throughout these provinces mementos and traditions worthy of the legends about the ogre and Blue-Beard. These feudal tyrants robbed travellers, pillaged churches, murdered the monks, carried off women, set fire to villages, and this, too, from father to son, through long centuries. The Marquis de Villemer worked out of these facts one of the most remarkable chapters of his book; drawing the conclusion that the descendants of this family though innocent, assuredly, of the crimes of their ancestors, seem, by their misfortunes, to have been expiating the triumphs of barbarism.
"Their citadel was impregnable. The rock is sliced down perpendicularly on all sides. The village forms a group below on the little hill which supports the block of lava. It is some distance from Lantriac. The insuperable ravines here make all distances great. Having started early, however, we arrived last Tuesday toward noon, and our little horse carried us to the foot of the postern. Peyraque left me there, in order to take care of our animal, and to look at some others, for he has quite a reputation in veterinary science, and wherever he goes, practice of this kind always comes to him.
"I found a little girl ten years of age to open the door for me; but when I asked to see Dame Roqueberte, the child told me with tears that her mother was dying. I hurried to where she lives,—a part of the castle still standing, in good repair,—and I found her the victim of a brain-fever. Little Didier was playing about the room with another of this poor woman's children; the latter child was quite happy, comprehending nothing, although the elder; while Didier, between smiles and tears, was looking toward the bedside with as much anxiety as a little creature of three years could be expected to show. When he caught sight of me, he came to me at once, and without coquetting before embracing me, as he did the first time, he clung to my dress, pulling me with his little hands, and saying 'mamma,' in a voice so plaintive and gentle that my whole heart was won by it. He was certainly telling me about the strange condition of his adopted mother. I drew near the bed. Dame Roqueberte could not speak; she knew no one. Her husband came in after a moment and began to be alarmed, for she had been in this state only a few hours. I told him it was time to send for a physician and a woman to take care of his wife, which he did at once; and as I could not be sure that it was not typhoid fever, I sent the children out of the room, warning the husband that it might be dangerous to leave them there.
"When the physician came at the expiration of two hours, he approved what I had done, observing that the disease had not yet defined itself and that the children must be placed in some other house. This change I undertook to make with the help of Peyraque, for the husband had quite lost his senses, and thought of nothing but having candles burnt in the village church and prayers mumbled in Latin which he could not understand, but which seemed to him of more efficacy than the doctor's prescriptions.
"When he had calmed down a little it was already four o'clock; and it was necessary for Peyraque to set out again with me, that the night might not overtake us in the ravine of the Gâgne. There was no moon for the moment, and a storm was impending. Then poor Roquebert began to lament, saying that he was ruined unless some one would take care of the children, and especially of 'the child,' meaning by that Didier,—the hen with the golden eggs for his household. Special care was needful for him; he was not strong like the children of the country, and besides he was 'curious,' he wanted to go everywhere, and these ruins are a labyrinth of precipices, where a young gentleman of this adventurous temper must not be lost sight of a single moment. He dared not trust him with any one. The money this little one had brought into his house had made others envious, he had enemies; what did I know about it? In short, Peyraque said to me in a low voice, 'Come, your good heart and my own bright ideas are at one in this matter. Remain here; I see they have the wherewith to lodge you comfortably; I will come back to-morrow to see how the case stands, and take you home if there is no further need of you.'
"I confess I desired this decision; it seemed as if it were a duty as well as a privilege to watch over the child. Peyraque returned the next day, and as I saw that Dame Roqueberte, though out of danger, would not be able to sit up for some days, I consented to remain, telling Peyraque not to come after me till the end of the week.
"I am very comfortable here, in a vast room, which is, I believe, an old hall for the guards, that has been divided into several portions for the use of the farmers. The beds, though very rustic, are clean, and the housekeeping I attend to myself. I have the three children at my side all the time. The little girl does the cooking while I superintend; I see to the attendance which must be given the mother; I wash and dress Didier myself. He is clothed like the others, in a little blue blouse, but with more care, especially since I have made it my concern,—and I am so fond of him that I dread the moment when I shall have to leave him. You know my passion for children,—that is, for some children; this one is certainly well born. Charley would be as jealous of him as a tiger. Because, you see, this Didier is surely the son of a superior man or woman. He is of high, fine descent, morally speaking; his face is of a somewhat dull whiteness with little flushes of color like those on standard roses. He has brown eyes of admirable shape and expression, and a forest of black hair, half inclined to curl, which is fine and soft as silk. His little hands are perfect, and he never soils them. He does not dig in the earth, and never touches anything: he passes his life in looking at things. I am sure he has thoughts beyond his years which he cannot express, or rather, a series of dreams, charming and divine, that cannot be translated into human language; yet he talks very fluently for one of his age, both in French and patois. He has caught the accent of the country, but makes it very sweet by his infantile lisp. He has the prettiest reasons in the world for doing as he pleases, and what he pleases is to be out of doors, climbing over the ruins, or crawling into their crevices; once there, he sits down, gazing at the tiny flowers, and especially at the insects, without touching them, but following all their motions, apparently interested in these living marvels, while the other children think only of crushing and destroying them.
"I have tried to give him his first notions in reading, being persuaded (contrary to the father's opinion perhaps) that the earlier you begin with children the more you spare them the heavy strain on the attention, so painful when their strength and activity have found greater development. I have tested his intelligence and curiosity; they are unusual, and with our wonderful method, which succeeded so well with your children, I am sure I could teach him to read in a month.
"And then this child is all soul, and his self-will melts into boundless affection. Our fondness is growing too fast really, and I ask myself how we are ever going to part.
"Besides, although I miss my Justine and Peyraque, I enjoy myself exceedingly among these magnificent ruins, commanding as they do one of the loveliest spots on earth. The air is so pure that the white stones, mixed with rough fragments of lava, are as bright as if just from a quarry. And then the interior of this immense castle is stored with very curious things.
"You must know that the Polignac family pretend to a descent from Apollo or his priests in a direct line; and that tradition consecrates the existence here of a temple to this god,—a temple of which some fragments yet remain. As for myself, I think there is no doubt of it, and that just to see these fragments is enough. The question to decide is whether the inscriptions and carvings were brought here to decorate the castle according to Renaissance usage, or whether the castle was built upon these vestiges. Dame Roqueberte tells me the scientific men of the country have been disputing over it for fifty years, and for my own part I agree with those who think the curbstone of the well was the mouthpiece of the god's oracles. The orifice of this immense well, with which another and a smaller well grotesquely communicates, was closed by a colossal head of noble outline, whose perforated mouth gave forth the subterranean voice of the priestess. Why not? Those who say it was only the mask of a fountain are no surer. The head has been preserved from destruction in the lower story of a little tower, along with a pile of stone bullets found in the well. I have amused myself by taking a sketch of it, which I send you in this letter, with a portrait of my little Didier at its foot, lying sound asleep at full length upon the temple of the god. It does not look like him, to be sure; but it will give you an idea of the fantastic and charming picture which I have had before my eyes for the last fifteen minutes.
"As for other matters, I do not read at all here. I have not Peyraque's eight or ten stray volumes and his big old Protestant Bible. I no longer try to improve myself; I hardly think of it even. I mend the clothing of my Didier, following him step by step; I dream, I am sad, but not rebellious, and not given to wondering any further about a state of things to which I ought to submit,—and I am in good health, which is the most important thing.
"Good old Peyraque comes in, bringing your letter. Ah! my sister, do not give up weakly, or I shall be in despair. You sayheis pale, already ill; and this gave you so much pain that you came near betraying me. Camille, if you have not strength enough to see a courageous man suffer, and if you do not understand that my courage alone can support his, I will set out again; I will go farther away still, and you shall not know where I am. Consider yourself notified, that the day I see the mark of a strange foot upon the sand of my island, I shall disappear so entirely that—"
Caroline left the sentence unfinished; Peyraque, who had just given her Madame Heudebert's letter, came back saying, "Here is thegentlemancoming."
"Who? what?" cried Caroline, rising and evidently quite troubled. "What gentleman?"
"The father of the unknown child,—M. Bernyer he calls himself."
"Then you know his name? No one here knew it or would tell it."
"On my word, I am not very curious; but he threw his valise on a bench at Roquebert's door, and my eye happened to fall upon it, so I read."
"Bernyer! I don't know any such person; perhaps I might show myself without getting into difficulty."
"Why, certainly you must see him, to tell him about the little one; now is the time."
Roquebert came in, however, and defeated Peyraque's design. M. Bernyer was asking for his son; but, according to his custom, he had gone into a room, reserved for him especially, and did not wish, just then, to see any one not of the family.
"It is all the same," added Roquebert. "I will tell him how you took care of my wife and the little boy, and he will certainly give me something good to repay you with. Otherwise I will do it myself, out of my own pocket. Be easy about that."
He took the child in his arms and went out, closing the door behind him, as if to shut out even a curious look from following him into the passage leading to the stranger's room.
"Well, let us set out," said Caroline, whose eyes were full of tears at the thought that she would probably never see Didier again.
"No," replied Peyraque, "let us wait a little and see what the gentleman will think, when he knows you have stayed here five days to take care of his child."
"But don't you see, my friend, that Roquebert will take care not to tell him? He will never dare to own that, during his wife's illness, he knew of nothing better than trusting the child to a stranger. And beside, is he not anxious to keep Didier a year longer, which would be very feasible? Will he let us give the father a hint that the child would not only be better cared for, with us, but also educated as he needs to be at his age? No, no. Dame Roqueberte herself, in spite of the care I have given her, will say that no one knows me, that perhaps I am only an adventuress; and while seeking gratitude and confidence, we shall look as if we were intriguing to get the few sous which have been offered us already."
"But when we refuse them it will be seen who we are. I am known myself; it is understood that Samuel Peyraque has never lied or held out his hand for money."
"This stranger knows nothing of all that, and he will inquire of the Roqueberts only because he knows nobody else. Let me set out quickly, my dear friend; I suffer every minute I stay here."
"Just as you like," said Peyraque. "I have not unharnessed, and we can let the horse rest at Le Puy; but nevertheless, if you would trust me, we should remain here one or two hours. Going thither from here, we would naturally meet on the way; the child would come to you and ask for you himself, he is so fond of you already. Look here now! If the gentleman should see you only one minute, I am sure he would say, 'Here is a person who is like no one else: I must speak to her.' And when he had talked with you—"
Arguing in this way, Peyraque followed Caroline, who had gathered up her clothing and was turning her steps toward the castle gate, quite determined to start. Passing before the bench where the stranger's valise was still lying beside his travelling-cloak, she read the name which Peyraque had reported faithfully; but at the same time she made a gesture of surprise and hurried along with unusual agitation.
"What is it now? asked the good man, taking the reins.
"Nothing,—a fancy!" replied Caroline, when they were out of the enclosure. "I imagined I recognized the hand of the person who wrote the name of Bernyer on that valise."
"Bah! it was written just like print."
"That is true; I am silly! Never mind; let us go on, my good Peyraque."
Caroline was absorbed in thought all the way. She accounted for the singular emotion which the sight of this disguised handwriting had caused her by what she had just experienced in reading her sister's letter; but she had a new anxiety. M. de Villemer had never told her that he had seen the castle of Polignac with his own eyes, but he had given a fine description of it, and an accurate one, in his book; he had taken it as an example of the strength of feudal restorations in the Middle Ages, and Caroline knew he often travelled into the provinces, in order to get a distinct impression of historic places. She searched all the recesses of her memory to find what could not possibly be there, to see if the Marquis had not accidentally chanced to tell her that he had visited Polignac. "No," replied she to herself, "if he had said so, I should have been impressed by it on account of the names Lantriac and Le Puy, which Justine had mentioned." Then she tried to remember whether, in connection with Polignac, she had not spoken of Lantriac and Justine; but she had never mentioned either of them to him, she was quite sure; so she grew calmer.
Yet she was agitated and thoughtful. Why had she taken such a fancy to this unknown child? What was the peculiarity in his eyes, his attitude, and his smile? Was it that he looked like the Marquis? In the idea which had so suddenly presented itself, of educating a little child and wishing for this one, might there not have been a vague instinct more powerful than chance or Peyraque's instigations?
With all this uneasiness there came, too, in Caroline's despite, the secret torment of a confused jealousy. "He has a son, then, a child of love?" said she to herself. "He must, then, have loved some woman passionately before he knew me, for frivolous adventures are incompatible with his exclusive nature, and there has been an important mystery in his past life! The mother is still living perhaps. Why is she supposed to be dead?"
Advancing among these feverish speculations, she recalled the words of the Marquis under the cedar in the Jardin des Plantes, and the struggle she had caught a glimpse of between his filial duty and some other duty, some other love, of which she herself might not be the object after all. Who knew whether the old Marchioness had not been equally at fault, whether the Marquis had told his mother the name of the person he wanted to marry; in short, whether she herself and Madame de Villemer had not both missed the truth?
Thus working herself into an involuntary excitement, Caroline strove in vain to feel reconciled to her fate. She loved, and for her the stronger feeling now was the fear rather than the hope of not being loved in return.
"What is the trouble?" asked Peyraque, who had learned to read her anxieties in her face.
She replied by overwhelming him with questions about this M. Bernyer whom he had seen once. Peyraque had a keen eye and a memory; but, habitually thoughtful and reserved, he bestowed his attention only on people who especially interested him. He drew, then, a picture of this pretended Bernyer so vague and incomplete that Caroline made no progress. She slept poorly that night, but toward morning she grew calm, and awoke saying to herself that there had been no common sense in her excitement of the day before.
Peyraque, having to go his rounds, could not linger till her awakening. He came in at nightfall. His air was triumphant.
"Our affair is working well," said he. "M. Bernyer will come here to-morrow, and you may rest easy; he is an Englishman, a sailor. You don't know any such person, do you?"
"No, not at all," replied Caroline. "You saw him again, then?"
"No, he had just gone out; but I saw Dame Roqueberte, who is better and begins to have her senses. She told me the little one cried last night, and before he fell asleep asked over and again for his Charlette. The father inquired who she was. It seems that Roquebert had no great wish to speak of you; but his wife, who is a good Christian, and the little girl, who is fond of you too, said you were an angel from heaven, and the gentleman replied he would like to thank you, and make you some recompense. He asked where you lived; he has never been at our house, but remembered me perfectly, and said he would come and see us soon. He promised the child this, and even that he would bring you back, in order to make him go to sleep."
"In all this," said Caroline, "I see only one thing, and that is, this stranger is coming to offer me money."
"Well, let him do it; so much the better! It will be an opportunity to show him you are not what he thinks. You will see one another, you will converse; he will find you are an educated young lady, above what he supposes you are, and I will tell him your history, because this history of yours does you credit."
"No, no," replied Caroline, quickly. "What! shall I intrust my secret to a stranger, after so many precautions to conceal my name and position?"
"But since you do not know him?" said Justine. "If you are agreed on the matter of the child, he should be intrusted with the whole. Having his secret, we can afford to give him ours. He would have no inducement to betray it."
"Justine!" cried Mlle de Saint-Geneix, who was near a window that faced the street. "Listen! Heaven! not another word. There he is, certainly, this M. Bernyer. He is coming here, and it is—yes, I was sure—it is he! It is M. de Villemer! O my friends, hide me! Tell him I am gone, that I am not coming back!—If he sees me, if he speaks to me,—can't you feel that I am lost?"
Justine followed Caroline, who had escaped to her own room, and made signs to Peyraque that he should receive the Marquis and be self-possessed.
Peyraque was equal to the emergency. He received M. de Villemer with the calm dignity of a man who has the most rigid ideas of duty. It was no longer a question of putting him in communication with the pretended Charlette; it was necessary to get him away before any suspicions arose in his mind, or, in case they had already arisen, to dispel them at once. From the first words of the Marquis, Peyraque saw that he suspected nothing. Desirous to set out again in a few days with his son, whom he intended to keep nearer to himself in future, he had made the most of a fine morning to come on foot and repay this debt of gratitude to some generous stranger. He had not supposed the distance so great, and was, therefore, a little late in arriving. He confessed he was somewhat tired, and, in point of fact, his face betrayed both weariness and suffering.
Peyraque hastened to offer him food and drink, the duties of hospitality preceding everything else. He called Justine, who had, by this time, regained her composure; and they waited upon M. de Villemer, who, catching at this opportunity of rewarding his entertainers generously, accepted their services with a good grace. He learned with regret that Charlette had gone away; but there was no reason why he should ask many questions about her. He thought of leaving a present for her, which Justine, in a low tone, advised her husband to accept, that he might not be surprised at anything. Caroline would readily find a chance to send it back. Peyraque did not see the necessity; his pride revolted at the idea of seeming to accept money on her account.
Caroline, in her little chamber, overheard this strife on a point of delicacy. The voice of the Marquis sent shudders through her. She dared not stir. It seemed as if M. de Villemer would recognize her footfall through the flooring. He, for his part, hoping to find a way of discharging his obligations under some different form, pretended and really tried to eat a little; and after this inquired whether he could hire a horse to return with. The night was dark and the rain came on again. Peyraque agreed to carry him back and went out to get his wagon ready; but first, he climbed up softly to Caroline's room. "This poor gentleman makes me uneasy," said he in a low voice. "He is very ill, that I am sure of. You can see drops of sweat on his forehead, and yet he creeps up to the fire like a man with a fever-chill. He could not swallow two morsels, and when he breathes hard it seems to affect his heart like a spasm, for he puts his hand there, smiling bravely all the while, but afterwards carrying it to his head, as one does in severe pain.
"Heavens!" exclaimed Caroline, in alarm, "when he is ill it is so dangerous! You must not carry him back to-night; your wagon is not easy, and then the bad roads and the cold, and this rain and his fever! No, no, he must stay here to-night. But where, pray? He would rather sleep out of doors than at the inn, which is so untidy. There is only one way. Keep him from going, keep him here. Give him my room. I will gather up my things; it will not take long, and I will go to your daughter-in-law's."
"With my son's wife or in the village, you will be too near. If he should happen to be a little worse in the night you would come in spite of yourself, to take care of him."
"That is true. What shall I do?"
"Do you want me to say? Well, you have courage and health: I will take you to Laussonne, where you can pass the night with my sister-in-law; it is as neat there as it is here, and to-morrow, after he goes, I will come for you."
"Yes, you are right," said Caroline, doing up her bundle hastily. "Make him agree to stay, and tell your son, as you go by, to harness Mignon."
"No, not Mignon! he has been travelling all day. We must take the mule."
Peyraque, having given his orders, returned to tell the Marquis the rain had set in for the whole evening, which was indeed true; and, giving Justine a significant glance, he urged him to stay so cordially that M. de Villemer consented. "You are right, my friends," said he, with his heart-broken smile; "I am somewhat ill, and I am one of those who have no right to wish for death."
"No one has that right," replied Peyraque; "but you will not be dangerously sick here with us, I assure you. My wife will take good care of you. The chamber up above is very clean and warm, and if you get worse you have only to knock lightly, just once; we shall hear it."
Justine went up stairs to prepare his room and embrace poor Caroline, who was really dismayed. "What!" said Caroline, speaking very low; "I know he is sick and I am going to desert him in this way. No. I was mad! I will stay."
"But that is just what Peyraque will never let you do," replied Justine. "Peyraque is stern; but what would you! Perhaps he is right. If you take pity on one another now, you will never be able to part again. And then—for myself I am sure you would never do anything wrong, but the mother—And then, think what other people might say!"
Caroline would not listen; Peyraque went up stairs, took her hand with an air of authority, and made her come down. She had put her poor heart under the guidance of this Protestant of the Cévennes; there was no longer any way of drawing back.
He led her out to the carriage and put in her bundle. At this moment Caroline, who had really lost her senses, escaped from his grasp, darted into the house through the kitchen-door, and caught sight of M. de Villemer, who was seated with his back toward her. She went no farther; her reason returned. And then his appearance reassured her a little. He had not that bruised, broken-down aspect she had seen him wear on the night of his former attack. He was sitting before the fire, reading in Peyraque's Bible. The little iron lamp hanging from the mantel-piece threw its light on his black hair, wavy like his son's, and partly also on his clear, strong forehead. M. de Villemer was doubtless suffering much, but he still wished to live; he had not lost hope.
"Here I am," said Caroline, returning to Peyraque. "He did n't see me, and I have seen him! I am more at ease. Let us start; but you must promise on your honor," added she, as she drew near the step of the carriage, "that if he is taken to-night with suffocation you will come for me at whatever damage to your horse. It must be done, do you see? No one else knows what this sick man needs in way of care—and you—you would see him die in your own house, and you would have it on your conscience forever!"
Peyraque promised, and they set out. The weather was dreadful, and the road frightful; but Peyraque knew every one of its holes and its stones. Besides, the distance was short. He left Caroline at the house of his sister-in-law, and had reached home again by eleven o'clock.
The Marquis was feeling better; he had gone to lie down after having chatted with Justine in such a friendly way that she was delighted. "Do you see, Peyraque, this man," said she, "he has a good heart like hers— I can understand it perfectly myself—"
"Stop talking now," said Peyraque, who knew the thinness of the flooring; "if he is asleep, we ought to sleep too."
At Lantriac the night passed in absolute quiet. The Marquis actually rested, and at two o'clock awoke, having shaken off the fever. He felt imbued with a pleasant calm, such as he had not known for a long time, and he attributed this to some sweet dream that he had forgotten, though its impression remained. Unwilling to awaken his hosts, he kept still, gazing at the four walls of the little chamber, brightly lighted by his lamp, and grasping the facts of his position more positively than he had done before since Caroline's departure. He had debated a thousand extreme measures; then he had said to himself that his first duty was to his son; and the sight of this child had given him the force of will he needed to resist the physical disease which now began to threaten him anew. Within twenty-four hours he had fixed upon a definite plan. He would take Didier to Madame Heudebert, leaving with her a letter for Caroline, and then quit France for some time, so that Mlle de Saint-Geneix, reassured by his absence, might return to be near her sister at Étampes. In the course of a few quiet weeks, the Marchioness would perhaps get further information, or perhaps her secret would be discovered by the Duke, who had sworn he would draw it from her by surprise. If the Duke failed, Urbain was not at the end of his resources. He would come back quietly to the castle of Mauveroche, where his mother, was to pass the summer with her daughter-in-law, and he would not let Caroline know of his return until he had cleared her in his mother's estimation, and thus again smoothed away every difficulty.
The most important and the most urgent thing, then, was to draw Mlle de Saint-Geneix from her mysterious hiding-place. The Marquis still thought she was in some Parisian convent. He found himself compelled to stay a few days longer in Polignac to make sure of Dame Roqueberte's complete recovery, before grieving her by taking away his son, and this delay had fretted him more than anything else. To cheat his impatience, he asked himself why he should not write to Madame Heudebert at once and to Caroline also, that they might be prepared to rejoin each other after his departure for a foreign land. By this means he would perhaps gain a few days. He could mail the letter at once, as he would pass through Le Puy on his return to Polignac.
What gave him the idea of writing from Lantriac was, mainly, the sight of the little bureau, where Caroline had left pens, some ink in a cup, and a few stray sheets of paper. These objects, on which his gaze fastened mechanically, seemed inviting him to follow his inspiration. He rose noiselessly, put the lamp on the table, and wrote to Caroline.
"My friend, my sister, you will not desert an unhappy man, who, for a year past, has centred in you the hopes of his life. Caroline, do not mistake my meaning. I have a favor to ask of you which you cannot refuse. I am going away.
"I have a son who has no mother. I love him devotedly; I intrust him to you. Come back!—As for myself, I go to England. You shall never see me again, if you have lost faith in me,—but that is impossible. When have I been unworthy of your esteem? Caroline—"
The Marquis stopped abruptly. An object of little importance had caught his eye. The ordinary paper, the steel pens, had no peculiarities; but one black bead lay on the table between his hand and the inkstand, a trifle insignificant in itself, but one bringing with it a whole world of memories. It was a bit of jet, cut and perforated in a certain unusual fashion. It was part of a valueless bracelet Caroline had worn at Séval; which he easily recognized because she used to take it off whenever she wrote, and he had himself formed a habit of toying with this bracelet while talking to her. He had handled it a hundred times, and one day she had said to him, "Pray don't break it, it is all I have left from my mother's jewel-box." He had looked at it respectfully, and held it lovingly in his hands. Just as she was on the point of quitting her little room in Lantriac, Caroline, in her precipitation, had broken this bracelet; she had picked up the beads hastily, leaving behind but this one.
This black bead reversed all the ideas of the Marquis; but what kind of dreaming was this? These cut jets might be an industrial product of the country he was then in. Nevertheless he sat motionless, absorbed in new surmises. He breathed and questioned the vague perfume of the room. He looked everywhere without moving from his chair. There was nothing on the walls, nothing on the table, nothing on the mantel. Finally he became aware of some bits of paper in the fireplace, which were not completely charred. He bent over the ashes, searched minutely, and found one single fragment of an address, only two syllables of which were legible: one, written by hand, was the last in the word Lantriac, the other, "am," forming part of the postmark. The postmark was that of Étampes, the handwriting that of Madame Heudebert. There could be no longer a doubt: Charlette was no one but Caroline, and perhaps she had never gone away, perhaps she was still in the house.
From that moment, the Marquis had the cunning, the watchfulness, the coolness, and the keen perception of a savage. He discovered the pipe from the little spring leading down to the sink below. The pipe itself was stopped up, but there was more than one fissure in the plaster which surrounded it. He put his ear down to it closely, and caught Peyraque's long, even breathing as he lay yet asleep.
Not a word, though spoken ever so low, could then escape him. In a few moments he distinctly heard Justine rise, uttering the words, "Come, get up, Peyraque; perhaps poor Caroline has not been sleeping so well as we have!"
"A night is a night," said Peyraque; "besides, I can't go for her till after he has gone away."
Justine listened and replied, "He does n't stir, but he said he should get up at daybreak. Daylight is n't far off now; he means to go away without taking anything, he said so."
"It is all the same," rejoined Peyraque, who had now risen, and whose voice was even more audible, though he spoke quite low; "I don't want him to set out on foot; it is too far. The lad shall saddle my horse, and when I have seen him fairly off, I will start for Laussonne."
M. de Villemer had made sure. He stirred a little to show he was up, and went down stairs after having slipped his purse into the bureau-drawer. He seemed very impatient to get back to Polignac, and declaring he felt perfectly strong, obstinately refused the horse. It would have been an encumbrance in the war of observation he was about to wage. He shook hands cordially with his entertainers and set out; but, on the borders of the village, having inquired about the road of a passer-by, he changed his course, plunging into a by-way that led to Laussonne.
He thought he could arrive there in advance of Peyraque, wait for him stealthily, and see him take Caroline back. When he had made sure of her return to Lantriac, he would lay his plans further. Until then, being quite aware she was trying to escape him, he would not risk losing track of her again. But Peyraque was very expeditious; Mignon travelled fast in spite of the roads which grew worse and worse, forming one unbroken ascent in the direction of Laussonne, and crossing more than one mountain declivity. The by-path cut off the angles of the main road but slightly, and the Marquis was distanced by the rustic equipage. He saw it pass and recognized Peyraque, who, for his part, thought he distinguished, in the morning fog, a man who was not in peasant garb, and who quickly retreated behind an embanking wall of rough stones.
Peyraque was suspicious. "Very likely," thought he, "he has been fooling us, or he has found out something. Well! if it is he, and if he is no more of an invalid than that, I will cure him of trying to follow a mountain horse on foot."
He urged Mignon forward, and arrived at Laussonne with the first rays of the sun. Caroline, in deadly anxiety, after a cruelly sleepless night, came out to meet him.
"All is going well," said he. "I was mistaken yesterday; he is not so very ill, for he slept well and would return on foot."
"So he is gone?" replied Caroline, climbing to her seat by Peyraque. "He never suspected anything, then? And I shall never see him again? Well, so much the better!" and she burst into tears under her hood, which she pulled over her face in vain. Peyraque heard her sob as if her heart would break.
"So you are the one going to be sick now?" said he, in a tone of paternal severity. "Come, be reasonable, or your Peyraque will never believe you when you tell him you are a Christian."
"So long as I do not weep before him, can you not excuse one moment of weakness in me? But what are you doing? Why are we going on toward Laussonne?"
Peyraque thought he again caught sight of the Marquis still creeping onward. "You must excuse me," said he, "but I have an errand to do in the village. It is quite near."
He entered the village, shrewdly thinking that the Marquis would still keep himself in sight at a distance. He went up the street and exchanged a few words with one of the townspeople. Pretexts could not fail to be at hand. Then, returning to Caroline, he said, "You see, my daughter, you have too much on your mind. I want to revive your spirits; you know an excursion always does you good. Would you like to have me take you on one—O, a very pleasant one!"
"If you have business anywhere, I don't want to incommode you. I will go wherever you like."
"I shall have to go to the foot of Mézenc, to the village of Estables. It is a beautiful place really, and you have been longing to see the grandest of the Cévennes."
"You said it would be hard travelling over there until after next month."
"Bless me! Why, the weather is cloudy, to be sure, and perhaps the roads are a little damaged. I have n't passed over them since last year; but they have been worked upon, as I have heard, and besides you know with me there is no danger."
"I assure you I am in no mood to worry about danger. Let us set out."
Peyraque hurried on his horse, which soon crossed the boundaries of Laussonne and bravely descended the rocky hill, climbing the other slope again without delay, and even more rapidly. When they had reached the top, Peyraque turned round, saw no one in the paths behind him, and looked at the road ahead, which was taking on a discouraging aspect. "You are going to see a wilderness," said he; "but that need n't annoy you, need it?"
"No, no," replied she; "when we are desperate we cease to be annoyed."
Peyraque went on, not without warning his companion repeatedly that the sun might not be disposed to shine, that they had four leagues to go, and that perhaps Mézenc would be under a fog. All this had little interest for Caroline, who did not guess the hesitation of her old friend or his qualms of conscience.
They traversed a mountain wooded with pines, and cut into by a vast glade,—the result of an ancient felling of the trees,—which opened a gigantic avenue, where the road, from a distance, looked like a highway for a hundred chariots abreast; but when the little carriage had ventured in, it was a frightful task to get over the ground, rain-soaked and hollowed out into deep ruts in a thousand places. Further on, it was worse still; the turf was strewed with blocks of lava, which left boggy places between them; and when they found traces of the travelled road again, they had to turn aside for monstrous piles of flints and pebbles, to stop altogether before deep cuts or trenches, to seek the old road among twenty others that lost themselves in the morass. The horse performed prodigies of courage, and Peyraque miracles of skill and judgment.
At the expiration of two hours, they had accomplished only two leagues, and were in open country on an interminable plateau, at an elevation of fifteen hundred metres. Except the breaks here and there in the road, nothing could be distinguished. The sun had disappeared; a thick mist enshrouded everything, and nothing can paint the feeling of bitter desolation which fell upon Caroline. Peyraque himself lost courage and kept silence. The obstructed road, which, he had been forced to leave one side did not reappear, and for the last fifteen minutes they had been pacing over a spongy turf, broken up by the hoofs of cattle in search of pasturage, but no longer bearing any traces of wheels. The horse stopped, bathed in sweat; he thus gave warning that he had never been over this ground before.
Peyraque alighted, sinking almost knee deep in the boggy soil, and tried to find where he was. It was out of the question. The mountains and ravines were only one plain of white vapor.
"Have we lost our way?" asked Caroline with cool indifference.
At this point the wind made a little opening in the fog, and they saw in the distance fantastic horizons empurpled by the sun; but the mist closed in again so quickly that Peyraque could not determine his position from this isolated peak in the distant circle of mountains. However, they heard a confused barking and then voices, though they could not distinguish the dogs till they were quite upon them. These dogs were the advance-guard of a caravan of men and mules carrying vegetables and leather bottles. They were mountaineers who had been down to the plains to exchange the cheese and butter of their cows for the fruits and vegetables of the level country. They accosted Peyraque, who asked information. They told him that he had done very wrong to think of going with a carriage to Estables at this season, that it could not be done, and that he would have to return. Peyraque showed some obstinacy, and asked if he was still far from the village. They guided him into the road again, telling him he had work before him for an hour and a half; but as their animals were loaded and warm, and they themselves in haste to arrive, these mountaineers offered no assistance, and disappeared, with a laugh at the little carriage. Caroline saw them rapidly vanish into the fog like shadows.
It was absolutely necessary to let the horse breathe, for a fresh effort to regain the solid road had exhausted him. "What comforts me," said Peyraque, really moved, "is that you don't complain of anything! It is very cold, nevertheless, and I'm sure the dampness has gone through your cloak."
Caroline replied only by a shiver.
A new shadow had just passed along the side of the road; it was M. de Villemer. He pretended not to see the carriage, although he did see it perfectly; but he chose to seem unconscious that it held any one he knew. He advanced with extraordinary energy, affecting an air of indifference.
"It is he! I saw him," said Caroline to Peyraque. "He goes wherever we go."
"Well, let him go on, and we will turn back."
"No, I cannot, I will not! He will die after such a walk. He will never reach Estables. Let us follow him."
This time Caroline's terror was so commanding that Peyraque obeyed. They came up with M. de Villemer, who moved aside to let them pass, without stopping or looking up. He would be neither intrusive nor rebellious, but he would know, he would follow to the death.
Unfortunately he was at the end of his strength. The difficulty of this walk, which from Lantriac had been a continual ascent and, for the last two leagues, one chaos of stones and peaty turf, had started on him a profuse perspiration which he could feel freezing in the blast of a sharp wind that had suddenly veered to the east. He lost his breath, and was forced to stop.
Caroline turned her head toward him, and was on the point of crying out. Peyraque seized her arm. "Courage, my daughter," he said, with his stern religious fervor. "The Lord requires it at your hands." And she felt herself overborne by the strong faith of the peasant.
"What do you want to do for him?" resumed Peyraque, as he still drove on. "He has had strength to come so far, he will have enough to go the rest of the way. A man does not die from the effects of a walk. He will rest at Estables. And if he is sick,—I shall be there."
"But he is following me! You see I shall have to speak to him there or elsewhere."
"Why should he follow you? He does not suspect you are here even. So many travellers want to see Mézenc."
"In such weather as this?"
"The sun rose brightly, and we ourselves started to see Mézenc."
The Marquis saw Caroline hesitate and submit. This was the final blow. No sooner had he seen himself left behind than he felt he could go no farther. He sank down on a stone, his eyes fixed on the black speck slowly vanishing from his sight, for the wind had risen suddenly and was violently scattering the fog, in whose stead there now came light flurries of snow and sleet. "So she would have me know nothing more of her?" said he to himself, as he felt his strength failing. "She flees from hope, she has lost faith. Then she never loved me!"
And he lay down to die.
"We must hasten, we must hasten!" said Peyraque, at the close of another half-hour, as he saw the snow deepening. "Here is something worse than fog. When this begins to fall it soon piles up in the road higher than your head."
This imprudent admission set Caroline in open rebellion; she wanted to jump from the carriage, fully determined to walk back to the place where she had met M. de Villemer.
Peyraque dissuaded her from this; but finally had to yield and return, in spite of the ever-increasing danger and the difficulties of a still slower progress over the half-league they had so painfully traversed since losing sight of the Marquis.
It was in vain for them to search by simply looking for him. In one hour the snow in large, spreading flakes had buried up the ground and its ruggedness. It was impossible for them to tell whether they had not passed by the place they wanted to explore. Caroline uttered groans, inaudible to herself, finding no words at her command but the faint outcry, "My God, my God!" Peyraque no longer strove to quiet her, and only encouraged her by telling her to look carefully.
Suddenly the horse stopped. "It must be we have found the road again here," said Peyraque. "Mignon remembers."
"Then we have come too far," replied Caroline.
"But we have met no one," returned Peyraque. "This gentleman, seeing the storm coming on, has gone back to Laussonne, and we, who are nearer Estables, are running a great risk in staying here, unless it stops snowing. I give you warning."
"Go on, go on, Peyraque!" cried Caroline, leaping into the snow. "For my part, I shall stay here till I find him."
Peyraque made no reply. He alighted and began searching, but without the least hope. There was already half a foot of snow, and the wind, drifting it into every hollow, would soon bury up a corpse.
Caroline walked on at random, gliding forward like a spirit, so great was her excitement. She was already at some little distance from the carriage when she heard the horse snort loudly as he put down his head. She thought he was dying, and, watching him with real distress, saw him scenting out something in front of him in a strange way. It was a revelation; she darted forward and perceived a gloved hand, apparently belonging to one dead, which the breath of the horse, melting the snow over it, had brought to light. The body extended beneath was the obstacle which the animal had refused to tread under foot. Peyraque came running at Caroline's call, and, extricating M. de Villemer, put him in the carriage, where Mlle de Saint-Geneix held him up and tried to warm him in her arms.
Peyraque took the bridle and walked on again in the direction of Mézenc. He knew perfectly there was not a moment to lose, but went on without knowing where to set foot; and he soon disappeared in a ravine which he was unable to clear. The horse stopped of his own accord; Peyraque got up again, but, on trying to make him back, found the wheels caught in some unseen obstacle. Besides, the horse was at the end of his strength. Peyraque treated him harshly, but all to no purpose; he struck his pony for the first time in his life; he pulled on the bridle till the creature's mouth bled. The poor animal turned upon him with a glance of almost human intelligence, as if to say, "I have done all I could; I can do nothing more to save you."
"Must we then perish here?" said Peyraque, disheartened, as he watched the snow falling in inexorable whirls. The plateau had become a Siberian waste, beyond which Mézenc alone showed his livid head between the gusts of wind. Not a tree, not a roof, not a rock for shelter. Peyraque knew there was nothing to be done.
"Let us hope," said he, which, in these Southern forms of speech, simply means, "Let us wait."
It soon occurred to him, however, that he would gain the next fifteen minutes, even if they should be the last of life. He took a small board from his little carriage, and fought with the drifting snow, which threatened to bury up both horse and vehicle. Incessantly for ten minutes he worked like a wrestler at this task of clearing away, saying to himself that perhaps it was all useless, but that he would defend himself and Caroline to the last breath.
At the expiration of the ten minutes he thanked God the snow grew lighter; the wind abated; the fog, which was far less dangerous, strove to reappear. He slackened his work without giving it over. At last he saw something like a pale streak of light breaking through the depths of the sky; it was a promise of fair weather.
So far he had not spoken a word or uttered an oath. If Caroline had been fated to perish there, she would not have suspected it till the last moment. Yet he looked at her and found her so pale and her glance so wild that he was alarmed.
"Well, well!" said he, "what is the trouble? There is no more danger; this will be nothing."
"O, nothing, is it?" she replied, with a bitter smile, pointing to Urbain, stretched out on the seat of the little vehicle, his face livid with the cold, his large eyes wide open and glazed, like those of a corpse.
Peyraque looked around him again. It was hopeless to expect human aid. He sprang into the carriage, seized M. de Villemer firmly in his arms, rubbed him vigorously, bruised him in his iron hands, trying to impart to him the warmth of his own old blood reanimated by exercise and a strong will; but it was all in vain. With the effects of the cold were united those of a nervous crisis peculiar to the organization of the Marquis.
"He is not dead, though," said Peyraque. "I feel that; I am sure of it. If I only had something to make a fire with! But I can't make one of stones."
"We might burn the carriage, at all events," cried Caroline.
"That is an idea,—yes, but after that?"
"After that perhaps the Lord will send help. Don't you see the first thing is to prevent death from laying hold of us here?"
Peyraque saw Caroline so pale and the blue lines so defined under her eyes that he began to think she felt herself dying also. He hesitated no longer, but risked all to save all. He unharnessed the pony, which, like the horses of the Cossacks, at once rolled in the snow to rest himself. Taking the awning from his carriage and placing it on the ground, Peyraque carried M. de Villemer, still frozen and motionless, to it; then, drawing from his boxes a few handfuls of hay, some old papers, and fragments of matting, he put the whole under the vehicle and struck fire with the flint and steel with which he was accustomed to light his pipe. Breaking up with his farrier's tools the boards and planks of his poor little carriage, he succeeded in a few moments in kindling them into a blaze and into brands. He demolished and broke in pieces as fast as the fire burned. The snow no longer fell, and M. de Villemer, lying within a semicircle of blazing wreck, began to gaze in a stupor at the strange scene, which he took for a dream.
"He is saved, saved! Do you hear, Peyraque?" cried Caroline, who saw the Marquis making an attempt to rise. "A hundred blessings on your head! You have saved him!"
The Marquis heard Caroline's voice close by him, but, still thinking it some hallucination, made no effort to look at her. He did not comprehend what was taking place till he felt on his hands the distracted pressure of Caroline's lips. Then he thought he must be dying, as she no longer avoided him, and, trying to smile, he bade her adieu in a faint voice.
"No, no; not adieu!" she replied, covering his forehead with kisses; "you must live. I will have it so! I love you!"
A slight flush came over the livid face, but no words could express his joy. The Marquis still feared it might be all a dream; yet he was plainly reviving. The warmth had concentrated under the carriage-top which served him as a shelter. He was as comfortable as he could possibly be made there, lying on the cloaks of Caroline and Peyraque.
"But we must go on, nevertheless," thought the latter, and his unquiet eyes questioned the brightening horizon. The cold was severe, the fire was going out for want of fuel, and the invalid surely could not walk to Estables. And was Caroline herself equal to such an attempt? To mount them both on the horse was the only expedient; but would the exhausted animal have strength to carry them? No matter, it would have to be tried; and, first of all, they must give the horse some oats. Peyraque looked, but found none; the fire had consumed the little bag as well as the box in which it was stored.
An exclamation from Caroline revived his hopes. She showed him a light vapor on the rising ground which sheltered them. He ran in that direction, and saw below him an ox-cart, painfully approaching, the driver smoking in order to keep warm.
"You see now," said Caroline, when the cart had nearly reached them, "the Lord has helped us!"
M. de Villemer was still so weak that he had to be lifted into the cart, which, fortunately, was loaded with straw; and in this Peyraque buried him up, after a fashion. Caroline placed herself near him. Peyraque bestrode his pony, leaving the wreck of his poor carriage behind, and in an hour they had finally reached the village of Estables.
Peyraque went disdainfully by the inn of a certain giantess with bare legs and a golden necklace, a veritable tardigrade of peculiar repulsiveness. He knew the Marquis would find no zealous attention there. He conducted him, to the house of a peasant whom he knew. The people crowded around the invalid, overwhelming him with questions, and friendly proffers which he did not understand. Peyraque, with an air of authority, dismissed all who could be of no service, gave his orders, and went to work himself. In a few minutes the fire was blazing, and hot wine was foaming in the kettle. M. de Villemer, stretched on a thick bed of straw and dry turf, saw Caroline on her knees beside him, busily engaged in protecting his clothes from the fire and caring for him with a mother's tenderness. She was uneasy about the terrible drink which Peyraque was brewing for him with strong spices; but the Marquis had confidence in the experience of the mountaineer. He made a sign that he would obey him, and Caroline, with trembling hand, put the cup to his lips. He was soon able to speak, thank his new hosts, and tell Peyraque, pressing his hand warmly, that he would like to be alone with him and Caroline.
It was no easy thing to induce the family to forsake their own roof for several hours. Places of shelter are rare under this inclement sky, and the flocks, the sole dependence of the Cévenois, are lodged in a way to leave no room for the inhabitants. Those living here, in particular, have a reputation for rudeness and lack of hospitality which dates from the murder of the mathematician sent by Cassini to measure the height of Mézenc, and who was taken for a sorcerer. They have greatly improved, and now show themselves more civil; but their habits of life are those of the lowest poverty, and yet they are given to trading, raise magnificent cattle, and are as well provided as possible with commodities for barter. Still, the severity of the climate and the isolation of their rough dwelling-place have passed into their dispositions as well as into their blood.
The room which, with the stable, comprised the whole interior of the house, was given up at last to Peyraque and his friends. It was quite small, and hardly richer than the Celtic grotto of the old woman at Espaly. The smoke poured out partly through the chimney and partly, also, through a gaping hole in the wall on one side. Two beds, shaped like boxes, gave lodgings at night, in some incomprehensible way, to a family of six persons. The bare rock formed the floor; and on one side the cows, goats, sheep, and hens took their comfort.
Peyraque spread clean straw around everywhere, brought in a supply of wood, rummaged in the cupboard, found some bread, and urged Caroline to eat and rest. The Marquis, with a look, begged her to think of herself, for she dared not leave him a minute, and still held his hands in hers. He wanted to speak; he was able to speak now, and yet he was afraid to say a word. He feared she would go away from him as soon as she saw he knew himself beloved; and then Peyraque puzzled him cruelly. He did not comprehend in the least the part played by this rustic Providence which, in its watch over Caroline, had shown itself so obstinate and so merciless toward him; but which was now beginning to regard him with unbounded solicitude and devotion. At last Peyraque went out. He could not forget his poor horse,—his faithful companion,—which he blamed himself for having treated so brutally, and which, on his arrival, he had been forced to intrust to the care of strangers.
"Caroline," said the Marquis, having seated himself on a stool, and still leaning on her arm, "I had many things to tell you, but I have not my reason,—no, really, I have n't the use of it, and I'm afraid to talk in my delirium. Forgive me, I am so happy,—happy to see you, to feel you near me, now I have come back again from the verge of death. But I cannot trouble you any more. Heavens! what a burden I have been on your life! It shall be so no longer; this is only an accident,—a foolish, imprudent act on my part; but how could I consent to lose you again? You do not know, you never will know,—no, you have no idea, you don't comprehend what you are to me; and perhaps you don't care ever to comprehend it! To-morrow, perhaps, you will shun me again. And why, pray? Here, read!" he added, searching for and then handing her the crumpled page of the letter begun at Lantriac that very morning; "it maybe illegible now; the rain and the snow—"
"No," said Caroline, leaning toward the fire, "I can see, I read perfectly, and—I understand. I knew before. I guessed; and I accept. It was the wish of my heart,—the dream of my life. My heart and my life, do they not both belong to you?"
"Alas! no, not yet; but if you would believe in me—"
"Don't tire yourself by talking, trying to convince me," said Caroline, with something imperious in her warmth. "I believe in you, but not in my own destiny. Well! I accept it, such as you make it for me. Good or ill, it shall be dear to me, since I can accept no other. Now listen, listen to me! Perhaps I have only an instant to tell you this in. I don't know what events your conscience and mine will have to meet; I know your mother to be inexorable. I have felt the chill of her contempt; and we have nothing to hope from God if we break her heart. We must submit, then, and that forever. You yourself have said that to form any scheme of being happy upon the loss of a mother is placing the dream of happiness among the most criminal of thoughts, and such happiness would be under the ban of a hundred curses; we ourselves should curse it in our hearts."
"Why do you remind me of all this?" asked the Marquis, sorrowfully; "do you think I have forgotten? But you believe a change in my mother to be impossible; and I see from this that you would not have me try to bring it about, and that pity alone—"
"You see nothing at all," cried Caroline, putting her hand on his mouth; "you see nothing, if you don't see that I love you."
"O Heaven!" said the Marquis, sinking to her feet; "say that again! It seems like a dream. This is the first time you have said it. I have thought I divined it, but I dare not believe it now. Tell me so again,—tell me, and then let me die!"
"Yes; I love you more than my own life," she replied, pressing to her heart the noble brow, seat of a soul so brave and true; "I love you more than my pride, more than my pride of womanhood. I have denied it to myself this long time; I have denied it in my prayers to God, and I lied to God and to myself! At last I understood, and I fled through a cowardly weakness. I felt all was lost, and so it is. Well, what matters it, after all? It only involves myself. While I cherished the hope of learning to forget, I could struggle; but you love me too well,—I see that now,—and you will die, if I forsake you. I thought you were dead a few hours ago, and then I saw clearly into our lives; I had killed you! I might have saved you,—you, the noblest and best of beings,—but I made you the victim of my vain self-respect. And what am I to let you die so, when all that is not your regard is nothing to me? No, no! I have resisted long enough. I have been proud enough, cruel enough, and you have suffered too much from my wrong-doing. I love you, do you hear? I will not become your wife, because that would be to plunge you into bitter remorse, into a woe beyond remedy; but I will be your friend, your servant, a mother to your child, your faithful companion. The purity of our lives may be misunderstood; I shall be mistaken for Didier's actual mother perhaps. Well, I consent even to that. I accept the scorn I have dreaded; and it seems to me drinking of this cup, poured out by you, will give me a new life."
"O noble heart! as pure as heaven!" cried the Marquis. "I accept, for my part, this divine sacrifice. Pray do not scorn me for that! You make me feel worthy of it, and I will soon put an end to it. Yes, yes! I shall work miracles. I feel strong enough now. My mother will yield without a regret. In my heart I feel now the faith and the power that shall persuade her to it. But even if the whole world should rise up to condemn you,—do you see?—you, my sister and my daughter, my pure-minded companion, my dearest friend,—you will only stand the higher in my regard. I shall only be more and more proud of you. What is the world, what is public opinion, to a man who has penetrated the social life of past ages and that of the present as well, fathoming the mysteries of their selfishness and the nothingness of their deceit? Such a man knows full well that, at all times, by the side of one poor truth which floats safely, a thousand truths go under with the mark of infamy upon them. He well knows that the best and most unselfish spirits have walked in the footprints of their Lord, on a thorny path, where wounds and insults fall like rain. Well, we will walk there, if need be; love will keep us from feeling these base attacks. Yes, I can answer for that, at least, and this is what I can swear in defiance of all threats from that destiny the world would make for us: you shall be loved, and you shall be happy! You knew me well, cruel one, shutting your eyes as you ran away. You knew perfectly that my whole life, my whole soul is love and nothing else. You knew perfectly that, if I have sometimes been eager in pursuit of truth, it was from love of her alone; and not for the vain glory of proclaiming her in person. I am not myself a scholar; I am not an author. I am an unknown soldier, who, of my own free will, avoid the noise and smoke of the conflict, fighting unsupported and in the background, not through lack of courage, but that my mother and brother may not be wounded in the struggle. I have accepted this obscure position without a pang to my vanity. I felt that my heart stood in need, not of praise, but of love. All the ambition of my fellows, all their immoderate vanities, their thirst for power, their needs of luxury, their continual hunger for notoriety,—what did all these matter to me? I could not be amused with toys like these. I was myself only a poor, single-hearted man, enamored of an ideal,—an ingenuous child, if you will, seeking love and feeling it alive within him long before meeting her who was to develop its power. I kept silence, knowing I should have to bear raillery,—a thing indifferent, as far as I am concerned personally, but one which would have pained me as an outrage to my inmost, sacred religion. Once, only once in my life,—I should like to tell you this, Caroline,—I have loved—"
"Don't tell me!" cried she, "I don't want to know."
"Nevertheless, you ought to know all. She was good and gentle, and, in recalling her, I can without an effort respect and bless her in her tomb; but she could not love me. It was the fault of her destiny, and not her own. There is not a reproach in my heart for her; there are many for myself. I have hated myself bitterly, and done heavy penance for having yielded to a passion which was never encouraged or really shared. I was only reconciled to life when I saw life blooming into its fairest and purest form in you. I then understood why I was born in tears, why I had been fated to love, and condemned to love too early,—with sorrow, and in sin,—because I sought the one dream and aim of my life too eagerly. And now I feel restored forever and saved. I feel that my character will regain its balance, my youth its hopes, my heart its natural sustenance. Have faith in me,—you whom Heaven has sent me! You know for a certainty that we are made for each other. You have felt a thousand times, in spite of yourself that we had but one mind and one thought; that we loved the same principles, the same art, the same names, the same people, and the same things without influencing each other, except to strengthen and develop what was already there,—to make the germs of our deepest feelings bud and blossom. Do you remember, Caroline, do you remember Séval? And our sunny hours in the valley? And the hours of delicious coolness beneath the arches of the library, where, with lovely vases of flowers, you paid festive honors to this deep, mysterious union of our souls? Was it not an indissoluble marriage which our hands consecrated every morning in their pure touch of greeting! Did not our first glance every single day give us to each other, and that for all time? And can all this be lost utterly, flown forever? Did you yourself believe for one instant that this man could live without you, deprived of air and sunlight,—that he would consent to fall back into darkness again? No, no! you never believed it. He would have followed you to the end of the earth; he would have gone through fire and water and ice to rejoin you. And if you had left me to die in the snow to-day, can't you feel that my spirit set free would have still, like a desperate spectre, pursued you through the mountain storm?"